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“This is What Real Spirituality is All About:” A Phenomenological Exploration of the Experience of Spirituality outside Institutional Religion
Abstract
Processes of personal and individual spiritual change outside institutional religion lack common moral guidelines and authority as well as accepted systems of beliefs and truths. Despite the existence of studies on processes of spiritual change outside religious doctrines (Fuller, 2001; Kraus, 2014; Streib et al., 2011), the issues of veracity, genuineness and validity in such contexts remain unaddressed. This study used a qualitative-phenomenological approach to explore how individuals who experience spiritual change outside institutional religion construe such issues during their spiritual journey. In-depth interviews with 27 Israeli adults (13 men and 14 women) undergoing such change revealed a pervasive concern with realness and major touchstones they developed as criteria to identify what they perceive as real spirituality: Others-oriented touchstones (dogmatic vs. open, unmediated and autonomic conduct; and seclusion vs. coping with real-life complexities) and self-oriented touchstones (bodily experience which provides a sense of ultimacy and attentiveness to signs).
... A different angle to this type of relative terminology is the term "spiritual but not religious" (Carey, 2018;Fuller, 2001;Parsons, 2018). The strategy here is to pry the related terms "spirituality" and "religion" apart, usually with the understanding that the latter, in putative contradistinction to the former, is connected to concepts such as institutions, social hierarchies, and dogmas (Marshall & Olson, 2018;Russo-Netzer, 2019). As discussed previously, however, scholars have sometimes criticized this attempt at prying spirituality apart from religion, and it might seem possible that people could be religious, in terms of seeing themselves as belonging to a specific religion, and yet not interested in the institutional expressions of this religion. ...
This dissertation presents and discusses a range of articles related to studies in entheogenic spirituality. As these studies have understood the matter, entheogenic spirituality is a phenomenon involving the use of entheogenic drugs – LSD, psilocybin, DMT, MDMA, and cannabis – in informal settings for spiritual purposes. It is connected to entheogenic experience, but also to the integration of experience for purposes of personal growth. The most common characteristics for entheogenic experiences were connected to insight, positive feelings, and improved connections to other people and to nature. Experiences with mystical-type characteristics such as ego dissolution and unification with transcendent forces were important to many spiritual entheogen users, but not to everybody, and rarely to spiritual cannabis users.
The individual articles relate the specific findings they discuss to extant research, although most of this research has been performed by academics working in fields outside the Study of Religions. There is also a small but growing literature on entheogenic spirituality by scholars of religion, however, and the overview article discusses how my research relates to this literature. In addition, it discusses the issue of how entheogenic spirituality challenges our understanding of religion in an overall sense, and particularly from the perspective on the relationship between religion and power. As a largely non-institutionalized form of religion, entheogenic spirituality does not conform to an understanding of religion as involving institutions. Nevertheless, it can be understood in relation to discourse, practice, community, and experience as a form of institution-less religion. Since entheogens are apparently highly efficacious means of inducing experiences with mystical-type characteristics, furthermore, and since such characteristics may serve as a basis for claims to spiritual authority, entheogenic spirituality has the apparent capacity to challenge the authority and power of religious institutions. The overview article discusses how a power-centric perspective on religion may help us understand both the position of entheogenic spirituality in modern western societies and the position of studies in entheogenic spirituality in the modern academy.
... Fornecem um sistema de crenças e visões do mundo, que contemplam sistemas globais de significado moral, desde o nascimento à morte; e, enquanto autoridades competentes, fornecem orientações claras sobre o que é verdadeiro e válido permitindo a distinção do que é entendido como sendo falso. (Russo-Netzer, 2018). ...
Religion is a very important context for many individuals in society and spirituality is seen as a fundamental dimension for the human being (Aldwin, et al, 2014). The main goals of this thesis was to find the possible relation between the religious practice with spiritual well-being levels and psychological flourishing levels; and to verify the relationship between spiritual well-being´s dimensions and psychological flourishing's dimensions. The instruments used for this subject were Spiritual Health and Life Orientation Measure (SHALOM) and PERMA-Profiler (Seligman, 2011, Butler and Kern, 2013). The sample included for this study 837 participants aged between 18 and years 83 (M = 41,34; SD = 11,972), 69.9% female and 30.1% male. 63.7% refer to have a religious practice. The demonstration of the results showed the existence of a significant relationship between having a religious practice and spiritual well-being levels, as well as with psychological flourishing levels. It was found the higher frequency of the religious practice increase the spiritual well-being and psychological flourishing levels. However, the study showed as well exactly the opposite, as the lower frequency of religious practice, the higher the levels of Negative Emotions and Loneliness dimensions of psychological flourishing will come out. The relationship between spiritual well-being and psychological flourishing dimensions proved to be positive all thought weak. The conclusion was, having a religious practice has an important role in a person's well-being, however, may not be meaningful for all human beings.
... The spiritual journey is nonlinear, has no final end point, involves conscious and unconscious actions, and (at its best) is morally driven/character driven (Russo-Netzer, 2016, 2017aRusso-Netzer and Mayseless, 2016;Mayseless and Russo-Netzer, 2017). It is directed toward a relationship with what is perceived as sacred. ...
Little attention has been given to the integral relationship between character strengths and spirituality (the search for or communing with the sacred to derive meaning and purpose). The science of character strengths has surged in recent years with
hundreds of studies, yet with minimal attention to spirituality or the literature therein. At the same time, the science of spirituality has steadily unfolded over the last few decades and has offered only occasional attention to select strengths of character (e.g., humility, love, forgiveness) or the universal typology of the VIA Classification of character strengths and virtues. In this exploration, we argue that there is a robust synergy of these sciences and practices revealing that spirituality is vitally concerned with promoting character strengths. At the same time, character strengths can enhance and deepen spiritual practices, rituals, and experiences. We elaborate on how character strengths and spirituality come together in the context of the psycho-spiritual journey toward wholeness. By wholeness, we are referring to a way of being in the world, which involves a
life-affirming view of oneself and the world, a capacity to see and approach life with breadth and depth and the ability to organize the life journey into a cohesive whole. We further discuss six levels by which spirituality can be integrated within the VIA
Classification, including a meta-perspective in which wholeness represents a meta-strength or superordinate virtue. We frame two pathways of integration: the grounding path, in which character strengths offer tangibility and thereby deepen and enhance
spirituality, and the sanctification path, in which spirituality elevates character strengths. Finally, we turn to research-based practices and examine how character strengths might facilitate and contribute to spiritual practices and, conversely, how spirituality might enhance character strength practices. Such multifaceted integration offers insight and wisdom to both areas of study and opens up new directions for psychospiritual research and practices to deepen and broaden our understanding of what it means to be human.
The purpose of this study is to examine how students attending a religious Zionist girls’ high school in Israel decipher and interpret—in religious terms—the Holocaust, an event that constitutes a Jewish national trauma. The study will focus on how an examination of aspects of the Holocaust as a Jewish historical event, which constitutes a reality-changing event, can form a basis of religious education. The study will propose to examine the issue through the implementation and use of an innovative six-stage structured pedagogical technique called a reflective culture of Holocaust remembrance (RCoHR), which shall be analyzed below. We will begin by explaining the theoretical background of the topic, then describe the research process and findings and conclude with an analysis of the pedagogical implications of the method for religious education and how Holocaust education could constitute a reflective means of enrichment for religious education.
Purpose of the study: The purpose of the current research was to gauge the effect of teachers self-efficacious, locus of control, and workplace spirituality beliefs on elementary students achievement scores. The researchers are intended to measure the effect of current practices happening in male public sector schools of district Lahore, Punjab-Pakistan.
Methodology: The current research was quantitative in nature, and the researchers used ex post facto design leading to a positivist paradigm. The researchers administered one questionnaire having three parts: i) Henson (1999) Sources of Self-efficacy Inventory; SOSI, ii) Rose and Medway (1981) Locus of Control Scale and, iii) Petchsawang and Duchon (2009) Workplace Spirituality Beliefs Scale whereas authors obtained students achievement scores from office of the Punjab Examination Commission during session 2018-2019.
Main Findings: Results of regression analysis declared that teachers self-efficacious beliefs affect 87.10%, locus of control 58.60%, and workplace spiritual beliefs affect 79.40% on students achievement scores.
Applications of this study: This research is applicable for headteachers and parents that may provide sources and resources for teachers and students to strengthen students idiosyncratic growth and pedagogic success. Findings of the research will applicable for the male teachers working in public sector elementary schools to make their teaching effective, scientific, and logical. Curriculum planners and policymakers revisit official documents to add data about teachers self-efficacious, locus of control, and workplace spirituality beliefs.
Novelty/Originality of this study: Applications of teachers utmost cognitive, social and spiritual potential escort required changes in students holistic growth. Authors have deliberatively identified that self-efficacious, locus of control and workplace spirituality beliefs are teachers considerable hallmarks which facile them towards students didactic success. Authors have significantly contributed in already existing body of knowledge in the field of cognitive and social psychology and spirituality.
Purpose of the study: The purpose of the current research was to gauge the effect of teachers self-efficacious, locus of control, and workplace spirituality beliefs on elementary students achievement scores. The researchers are intended to measure the effect of current practices happening in male public sector schools of district Lahore, Punjab-Pakistan. Methodology: The current research was quantitative in nature, and the researchers used ex post facto design leading to a positivist paradigm. The researchers administered one questionnaire having three parts: i) Henson (1999) Sources of Self-efficacy Inventory; SOSI, ii) Rose and Medway (1981) Locus of Control Scale and, iii) Petchsawang and Duchon (2009) Workplace Spirituality Beliefs Scale whereas authors obtained students achievement scores from office of the Punjab Examination Commission during session 2018-2019. Main Findings: Results of regression analysis declared that teachers self-efficacious beliefs affect 87.10%, locus of control 58.60%, and workplace spiritual beliefs affect 79.40% on students achievement scores. Applications of this study: This research is applicable for headteachers and parents that may provide sources and resources for teachers and students to strengthen students idiosyncratic growth and pedagogic success. Findings of the research will applicable for the male teachers working in public sector elementary schools to make their teaching effective, scientific, and logical. Curriculum planners and policymakers revisit official documents to add data about teachers self-efficacious, locus of control, and workplace spirituality beliefs. Novelty/Originality of this study: Applications of teachers utmost cognitive, social and spiritual potential escort required changes in students holistic growth. Authors have deliberatively identified that self-efficacious, locus of control and workplace spirituality beliefs are teachers considerable hallmarks which facile them towards students didactic success. Authors have significantly contributed in already existing body of knowledge in the field of cognitive and social psychology and spirituality.
The emphasis on health and wellbeing in government schools is a new development, drawing on the problems created by the postmodern era. Despite Australia’s wealth, recent studies have shown that health and wellbeing, as well as a sense of belonging, have declined in Australian society and schools. The aim of this chapter is to investigate to what extent SRE/RI can contribute to addressing this problem. Educationalists have become aware of the importance of positive psychology (Seligman 2002), developing on the earlier theories of Maria Montessori ([1915] 1997). They have also developed a better understanding of the concept of the “greater good” and the psychological problems created by the contemporary focus on individual needs rather than community needs. The study of (Chen and Vanderweele 2018) demonstrates the centrality of belief in a higher spiritual being, of prayer, both public and private, as well as meditation, as directly producing positive health outcomes and protecting against negative behaviours. As well, Nielsen (2010) has demonstrated the importance of gratitude as a factor in giving and this is a key component of all religious prayer. These important findings are discussed in this chapter as well as our research findings from 58 interviews with directors, teachers and graduates either individually or in focus groups of the six main faith groups: Christianity (18), Islam (12), Buddhism (9), Hinduism (7), Judaism (7) and Baha’i (5). The chapter concludes with an explanation of the connections between spirituality, wellbeing and religious belief. We argue that SRE/RI can develop these important attributes so that SRE/RI can foster better health and community and social cohesion.
This book explores the advantages of and challenges concerning Special Religious Education (SRE) in multicultural Australia and argues for the need for General Religious Education (GRE) as well. Through the lens of the most recent scholarship, and drawing on an in-depth qualitative study and specific case studies, the book examines the current debate on the role of religious education within government schools. It addresses key concepts of values education, spirituality, health and wellbeing, and cultural and religious identity. It analyses why it is important to retain SRE, together with GRE, as government policy. It explores highly relevant, controversial and contested issues regarding SRE, including the 30% of Australia’s population who declare themselves as having “no religion”, and brings fresh insights to the table.
While secularization has increased in both the national and international spheres, there has also been an increase in fundamentalism within religious beliefs. Events such as the September 11 terror attacks and the more recent mass shootings by white supremacists and eco-fascists in Christchurch, New Zealand, and Pittsburgh and San Diego in the USA are reminders that religion is still a major actor in the twenty-first century. This poses new challenges for the relationship between church and state, and demonstrates the need to revisit the role of religious education within government schools. While the importance of GRE is generally acknowledged, SRE has increasingly come under attack by some researchers and teacher and parent bodies as being inappropriate and contradictory to the values of the postmodern world. On the other hand, the key stakeholders from all the faith traditions in Australia wish to retain the SRE classes in government schools. The book addresses this burning issue, and shows that it is relevant not only for Australia but also globally.
This paper focuses on the epistemological and experiential aspects through which we can gather together the fragmented pieces of our reality. In it, I aim to broaden the overarching framework of wholeness in second wave positive psychology (PP 2.0) and argue that healing the growing divide between components of humans, systems, and disciplines must be acknowledged and validated as essential to achieving a more complete wholeness.
First, I advocate for expanding our ways of knowing, by becoming aware of and embracing multiple dimensions and perspectives. This includes listening to the human voice and understanding the human context. It also includes being open-minded and open-hearted in approaching varied ways of knowing. Second, I advocate for broadening the scope of what it means to be human. This includes understanding and validating humans holistically by moving beyond zero-sum, binary categories to consider the value of human paradoxes, limitations, and complexities, as well as appreciating the joining of opposites and the value of brokenness. I then conclude with a few suggestions for future application of these ideas, and offer concluding remarks.
The present study employed a qualitative phenomenological method to explore how processes of spiritual change were experienced outside institutional religion. In-depth interviews were conducted with 27 Israeli adults (13 men, 14 women; age range 25–66; M = 45.3) who experienced such a change. The findings underscored the pervasiveness of the concept of work, which was extensively discussed by all the participants and which reflected the meaning they ascribed to their experience of the change process. Spiritual work was experienced as effortful, demanding, and involving a gradual non-linear process without a clear end-point. Spiritual work on the self was perceived as involving two complementary processes: uncovering and cleansing the self—the Spiritual-Psychological facet—and expanding it and rising above—the Spiritual-Transpersonal facet. The discussion suggests that the interplay of psychological and transpersonal spiritual work makes up an alternative narrative of human personal development where modern values of work sustain a postmodern change process.
The New Age is often depicted as the quintessential spiritual marketplace in which seekers freely choose from an array of religious options. Empirically it is correct to point out that the movement has formed largely around consumption of goods and services offered for sale. Yet its commercial aspect is often conceptualised in relatively superficial terms. The notion that it is a ‘spiritual supermarket’ has been used to suggest that New Age consumer practices are trivial or socially insignificant. This has led some to call for a turn away from reductive market models. However, this article proposes that New Age studies should instead examine and theorise commercial dynamics more thoroughly, taking the lead from work in other disciplines that increasingly shows how economic, cultural and social life are deeply imbricated. Overcoming the taint of the spiritual supermarket allows a range of issues in the field to be explored more comprehensively.
The article concerns the relationships between religion, analyzed within the framework of the religious meaning system, and religious coping as well as eudaimonistic well-being in the mediational perspective of meaning in life. In order to verify the hypotheses, two empirical studies (N = 187 and N = 177 people) were carried out to determine the nature and extent of the relationships between the above factors. The results showed that the religious meaning system was positively linked to eudaimonistic well-being, while negative religious strategy showed a negative relationship with it. There was also a positive relationship between religiosity and the dimensions of meaning in life: presence and search. The presence of meaning in life, in contrast to search, turned out to be a mediator in the relationships of the religious meaning system and religious coping with eudaimonistic well-being.
Replies to the comments by Jon Allen (see record 2014-56345-004) on the original article by Kenneth Pargament et al. (see record 2014-56345-003) regarding sacred moments in psychotherapy from the perspectives of mental health providers and clients. we take issue with Allen on only one point in his tremendously encouraging commentary. We would say that the task for researchers interested in the spiritual dimension of psychotherapy is not to stay out of the stream and keep both feet firmly on the bank. Rather the challenge is to maintain our balance while we attempt to keep one foot in the water and, at the same time, one foot in the stream; avoiding the dangers of spiritual reductionism on the one hand and spiritual fuzziness on the other.
This article describes a new conceptual approach to youth spiritual development, positing it as a universal aspect of positive youth development, and presents initial empirical evidence for the cross-cultural validity of this theory. Based on an international survey with 6725 youth in eight countries, it provides a global portrait of the spiritual lives of 12-25 year olds. The development and psychometric properties of core spiritual development and religious/spiritual engagement across nations and religious traditions are described. Finally, a person-centered analytic technique is used to explore profiles of the unique ways spiritual development manifests itself in the lives of young people. Results suggest that spiritual development is an active process among the majority of youth across diverse religious and cultural backgrounds, with most having spiritual development unfold without particularly strong engagement in explicitly religious or spiritual practices.
This article focuses on the appropriation of New Age values, images, and language by different sectors of the mainstream in a Western society—in Israel. The findings support earlier research about the shift in values in the mainstream of Western societies. Specifically, this is a shift towards the admiration of nature, Far Eastern lore, a search for a ‘balanced’ way of life, and so on, in accordance with New Age values. This article analyzes how, and for what purpose, mainstream advertisements appropriate New Age elements. The analysis of about 100 advertisements from the last decade leads to the conclusion that all mainstream sectors, including relatively conservative ones (such as academic institutions), borrow elements from New Age, but differ in the intensity and form of appropriation: some are interested in simply attracting attention, while others directly appropriate New Age values. This article discusses the differentiation between the receptivity of specific sectors to New Age and explores possible motivations for the use of New Age elements, such as the more conservative sectors’ use of esoteric elements of New Age.
This study explores the essence and meaning of the lived experience of spirituality outside institutional religion among individuals who experienced spiritual change. Based on a phenomenological analysis of in-depth interviews conducted with 25 Israeli adults, 12 men and 13 women between the ages of 25 and 66 years (M = 45.3), the findings indicate that the developmental process experienced by the participants yielded the establishment of a new identity—a clear and committed spiritual identity different from the modern (e.g., identity statuses) and some of the postmodern (i.e., hyphenated or hybrid) customary conceptualizations of identity. Within this general sense of spiritual identity, three major themes were identified that can be seen as dialectic dimensions: (1) self-centeredness and authenticity together with self-dissolution and surrender, (2) “being there” together with becoming, and (3) alienation together with a sense of mission. The similarities and differences between this spiritual identity and other forms of identity are discussed.
Bracketing is a method used in qualitative research to mitigate the potentially deleterious effects of preconceptions that may taint the research process. However, the processes through which bracketing takes place are poorly understood, in part as a result of a shift away from its phenomenological origins. The
current article examines the historical and philosophical roots of bracketing, and analyzes the tensions that have arisen since the inception of bracketing in terms of its definition, who brackets, methods of bracketing, and its timing in the research process. We propose a conceptual framework to advance dialogue around
bracketing and to enhance its implementation.
This paper elaborates processes of identity construction and avowal among homeless street people, with two underlying and interconected objectives in mind: to advance understanding of the manner in wich individuals at the bottom of status systems attempt to generate identities that provide them with a measures of self-worth and dignity and to shed additional empirical and theoretical light on the relationships among role, identity, and self-concept. The data are from an ethnographic field study of homeless street people. "Identity talk" constitutes the primary form of "identity work" by means of which homeless street people construct and negotiate personal identities. Theree generic patterns of identity talk are alborated and illustrated: distancing, embracement, and fictive storytelling. Each form contains several subtypes that vary in usage according to the length of time one has spent on the streets. The paper concludes by discussing the theoretical implications of the findings and suggesting a number ...
Most adults in a community sample (N = 150; ages 25-56) perceived their top 10 strivings as being connected to God (theistic sanctification) and having sacred, transcendent qualities (nontheistic sanctification), with highest ratings given to religious goals, family relationships, altruistic endeavors, and existential concerns. Greater sanctification of strivings correlated positively with the importance, commitment, longevity, social support, confidence, and internal locus of control of strivings. Based on 5 phone interviews about the prior 48 hr, people invested more time and energy in their 2 most highly sanctified strivings than their 2 least sanctified strivings. Greater sanctification of strivings related to a greater sense of life purpose and meaning and joy yielded by strivings but not fewer psychological or physical health difficulties.
Sustained attention to spiritual development during childhood and adolescence in the social and developmental sciences has the potential to significantly enrich and strengthen the understanding of the core processes and dimensions of human development. This article seeks to set the stage for such an inquiry by exploring 6 themes for building a multifaceted agenda. It argues that spiritual development is (a) understudied; (b) a complex, multifaceted concept; (c) grounded in a human propensity; (d) overlaps with and includes many aspects of religious development; (e) a developmental process that is shaped by both individual capacities and ecological influences; and (f) a potentially powerful resource for positive human development.
This article examines concepts of the trustworthiness, or credibility, of qualitative research. Following a "researcher-as-instrument," or self-reflective, statement, the paradigmatic underpinnings of various criteria for judging the quality of qualitative research are explored, setting the stage for a discussion of more transcendent standards (those not associated with specific paradigms) for conducting quality research: social validity, subjectivity and reflexivity, adequacy of data, and adequacy of interpretation. Finally, current guidelines for writing and publishing qualitative research are reviewed, and strategies for conducting and writing qualitative research reports are suggested. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
The language of psychology is all-pervasive in American culture-from The Sopranos to Oprah, from the abundance of self-help books to the private consulting room, and from the support group to the magazine advice column. Saving the Modern Soul examines the profound impact of therapeutic discourse on our lives and on our contemporary notions of identity. Eva Illouz plumbs today's particular cultural moment to understand how and why psychology has secured its place at the core of modern identity. She examines a wide range of sources to show how self-help culture has transformed contemporary emotional life and how therapy complicates individuals' lives even as it claims to dissect their emotional experiences and heal trauma.
According to John Adair, the most important word in the leader's vocabulary is "we" and the least important word is "I". But if this is true, it raises one important question: why do psychological analyses of leadership always focus on the leader as an individual - as the great "I"? One answer is that theorists and practitioners have never properly understood the psychology of "we-ness". This book fills this gap by presenting a new psychology of leadership that is the result of two decades of research inspired by social identity and self-categorization theories. The book argues that to succeed, leaders need to create, champion, and embed a group identity in order to cultivate an understanding of 'us' of which they themselves are representative. It also shows how, by doing this, they can make a material difference to the groups, organizations, and societies that they lead. Written in an accessible and engaging style, the book examines a range of central theoretical and practical issues, including the nature of group identity, the basis of authority and legitimacy, the dynamics of justice and fairness, the determinants of followership and charisma, and the practice and politics of leadership. The book will appeal to academics, practitioners and students in social and organizational psychology, sociology, political science and anyone interested in leadership, influence and power.
To the founding fathers of psychology, spiritual phenomena represented critically important topics for psychological study. Since the early part of the twentieth century, however, psychologists have tended to (a) ignore spirituality; (b) view spirituality as pathological; or (c) treat spirituality as a process that can be reduced to more basic underlying psychological, social, and physiological functions. Fortunately, this situation has begun to change (Weaver, Pargament, Flannelly, & Oppenheimer, 2006), for several good reasons. First, spirituality is a "cultural fact" (cf. Shafranske & Malony, 1996): the vast majority of Americans believe in God (90%), engage in prayer (90%), and feel that religion is very important or fairly important to them (84%) (Gallup, 2004; Poloma & Gallup, 1991). Second, as we will see, empirical studies have linked spirituality to a number of aspects of human functioning. Finally, in a more practical vein, the American Psychological Association has defined religiousness as a "cultural diversity" variable. Although it has received relatively less attention than other diversity variables, psychologists are no less ethically obligated to attend to this dimension and reduce potential biases in their professional work with clients of diverse religious backgrounds (see Principle D, Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct of APA, 1992).
Cover Blurb: Researching Lived Experience introduces an approach to qualitative research methodology in education and related fields that is distinct from traditional approaches derived from the behavioral or natural sciences—an approach rooted in the “everyday lived experience” of human beings in educational situations. Rather than relying on abstract generalizations and theories, van Manen offers an alternative that taps the unique nature of each human situation.
The book offers detailed methodological explications and practical examples of hermeneutic-phenomenological inquiry. It shows how to orient oneself to human experience in education and how to construct a textual question which evokes a fundamental sense of wonder, and it provides a broad and systematic set of approaches for gaining experiential material that forms the basis for textual reflections.
Van Manen also discusses the part played by language in educational research, and the importance of pursuing human science research critically as a semiotic writing practice. He focuses on the methodological function of anecdotal narrative in human science research, and offers methods for structuring the research text in relation to the particular kinds of questions being studied. Finally, van Manen argues that the choice of research method is itself a pedagogic commitment and that it shows how one stands in life as an educator.
Social learning must be considered among the major candidates for explaining why and how people become spiritual or religious, and why their spirituality or religion assumes a particular form. A social learning view of spiritual and religious engagement is also amenable to many practical applications. It may be used by people who seek to deepen their own learning of spirituality or religion as well as by human service professionals who have identified spiritual or religious factors as relevant to client wellbeing (Oman et al., 2009). And for millennia, social learning has been of interest to religious and spiritual teachers and educators (see epigraphs). Religious educators often place high value on the power of example, saying that religion and spirituality are “caught, not taught.” A social learning perspective therefore represents important common ground shared by scientific and religious communities. In this chapter, we will review key elements of social learning theory as applied to spiritual modeling, discussing evidence for spiritual modeling processes in religious traditions. Next, we review recent empirical and theoretical work on spiritual modeling. We close by suggesting implications, limits, and future directions.
Studies show that different dimensions of religiosity change throughout the life course. Yet, we have little information about how spirituality that some people experience outside of formal religious organizations may change. The purpose of this study is to examine how spirituality associated with artistic leisure may emerge or decline over time. Drawing from two waves of semistructured qualitative interviews conducted five years apart, I examine how the spirituality dancers associate with belly dance changes over time and factors associated with those transformations. Rather than emerging, findings show that whether dancers instill belly dance with spirituality remains stable or decreases. Furthermore, much of the decrease in the spiritual meaning that dancers link to belly dance can be understood in the context of their changing involvement in the dance, different meanings they attach to belly dance, revisiting their personal beliefs about spirituality, and expanding their spiritual outlets.
Human life begins in the middle, in the midst, and sometimes in the darkness. Or even in the woods. In the woods – you're in the middle and if you are always in the middle there is no home, or refuge or cave – a sure space that you have access to. It means then that the best we can do is to somehow try to strengthen our armor on the Socratic level – which is we must have courage to engage in critical reflection on being in the middle, knowing that there is always a remainder for Adorno the stuff that theories can't catch. It is the blind spots, the wasted material. Blind spots and wasted material that the dialectics cannot catch, which is the saying that there is a humility in being in the middle and to think you gain access to pure spaces of intellectual arrogance, which is blinding all the time and misleading. So, if you have a humility, which is not so much to come to skepticism, it is simply to say you would resist, you would transgress, you would continually try to transcend, you will fail, you will fall on your face, you would be inadequate, you won't have the conceptual clarity and transparency associated with pure spaces – you are a bluesman. There is no way out.
This article explores ethical theories as variations on two biblical stories of the origins of morality: morality as the necessity to make choices and assume responsibility and morality as conformity to a rule set by a supreme power. It looks at Knud Løgstrup's and Emanuel Levinas's theories as the most prominent examples of the first approach — and thus best fit to grasp the realities of moral life under contemporary conditions of existential uncertainty and the only ones which perceive in the plurality of choices the natural home of the moral self, rather than a threat to morality. The meaning of Løgstrup's `unspoken demand' and Levinas's `unconditional responsibility'; responsibility to the weaker versus obligations to the stronger; moral choice as the aspect of human condition versus justice as the outcome of social action are also explored.
Introduction Conceptualizing Alternative Spirituality Talking About Self and Community Ideological Strains: Spirituality and Science Other Dualisms: Earth/Sky, Goddess/God, Darkness/Light Ideological Limitations Mythology as Ideology Conclusion Appendix A Appendix B Bibliography Index
In the late twentieth century there has been a proliferation, diversification and popularisation of New Age spiritual discourses and practices in Western industrialised nations. New Age spiritual thinkers such a Deepak Chopra, Ken Wilber, Gary Zukav and Shakti Gawain, have modified discourse and practices from Eastern and Western traditional religious beliefs, Western science and psychotherapy, to develop their own discourse and practices designed to assist individuals “transform” themselves. This article discusses the “commodified production of self‐actualisation” in consumer society and discusses how the discourses and practices in selected texts from four New Age spiritual thinkers take the form of an ever‐changing “social product”. The analysis shows how the discourse and practices of New Age spiritual thinkers align themselves with consumptive behaviour by secularising, homogenising and over‐simplifying scientific, social scientific and traditional religious discourse and practices into “social products” for consumption. The analysis also reveals that New Age spiritual thinkers are engaged in a process that could be described as the “consumption of the self”. The implications of the “consumption of the self” will be discussed in terms of the way consumer society requires New Age “technologies of the self” to be continually redefined, restructured and repackaged in new and different forms.
Jung was intrigued from early in his career with coincidences, especially those surprising juxtapositions that scientific rationality could not adequately explain. He discussed these ideas with Albert Einstein before World War I, but first used the term "synchronicity" in a 1930 lecture, in reference to the unusual psychological insights generated from consulting theI Ching. A long correspondence and friendship with the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Wolfgang Pauli stimulated a final, mature statement of Jung's thinking on synchronicity, originally published in 1952 and reproduced here. Together with a wealth of historical and contemporary material, this essay describes an astrological experiment Jung conducted to test his theory.Synchronicityreveals the full extent of Jung's research into a wide range of psychic phenomena.This paperback edition of Jung's classic work includes a new foreword by Sonu Shamdasani, Philemon Professor of Jung History at University College London.
This article points out the criteria necessary in order for a qualitative scientific method to qualify itself as phenomenological in a descriptive Husserlian sense. One would have to employ (1) description (2) within the attitude of the phenomenological reduction, and (3) seek the most invariant meanings for a context. The results of this analysis are used to critique an article by Klein and Westcott (1994), that presents a typology of the development of the phenomenological psychological method.
Several problems are involved in studying the New Age, ranging from mapping its enormous diversity of beliefs and practices to locating it with reference to the conditions of modernity and postmodernity. With the latter issue in mind, the article is an analysis of understandings of truth and authority in the New Age. Against the assumption of some theorists, one of the central aims of the discussion is to demonstrate that, epistemologically speaking, the New Age is essentially a manifestation of modernity rather than postmodernity. Having established that, it is also shown that there are certain postmodern elements within the New Age network, as well as a superficial embracing of postmodernity and an emerging postmodern critique, all of which produce increasingly apparent tensions and confusion. The final section provides a critique of some of the principal problem areas.
What accounts for the links between religion and health and well-being? This question was central to the commentators' responses to the target articles. Many of the commentators provided fresh new ways of explaining religion in psychological, social, physiological, and evolutionary terms. A few, however, came perilously close to the slippery slope of radical reductionism. In this article, I argue that religion is, by definition, unique, for it has a singular point of reference, the sacred. In addition, I review empirical studies assessing the independent predictive power of religion; they suggest that religion is a unique source of motivation and values, a unique form of coping, and a unique source of distress. Finally, I contend that social scientists should learn more about the connections between religion and health and well-being, not to explain religion away, but to gain a more complete understanding of religion and human nature more generally. Researchers should remember that religion represents not only a resource for psychological well-being and physical health, but a distinctive human dimension that carries meaning and power in and of itself.
Every human action, ranging from benevolence to inhumane violence has been justified in the name of religion, which has been a pervasive feature of human life throughout history. This article describes religion as a meaning system that is unique in centering on what is perceived as sacred, and in its special ability to address the quest for meaning. The article recommends the meaning system approach for the study of religion, suggesting that this approach can illuminate the resiliency of religion, and its complicated relations with individual and societal well-being. It describes the outline of the volume, and concludes with recommendations for research, education, and policies in the arena of religion that can facilitate well-being in the new millennium.
We use a case study of individuals who leave ultra-Orthodox Judaism to illustrate that essential characteristics of the institutions they leave, such as their degree of encapsulation, shape both processes and narratives of identity change. Through examining the narratives of these exiters and comparing them to the literature on conversion into strict religious groups, we find that there is more institutional support for conversion into a group than for disaffiliating from a group. In conversion, recruits are provided with institutional scripts that shape their narratives; those who leave strict religious communities have no parallel ready-made accounts. Those that leave ultra-Orthodoxy state that they did not have a language to guide them in their transition into secular society. Nevertheless, despite their presentation of themselves as “scriptless” they also present themselves as brave individuals who are proud of their ability to leave a community that had encompassed all aspects of life.